Golpe Borghese

The Golpe Borghese was a failed Italian coup d'etat planned for the night of 7-8 December 1970. The coup attempt was to be led by Junio Valerio Borghese, the commander of the elite Decima Flottiglia MAS naval sabotage unit during World War II, and a prominent neo-fascist leader in the postwar era. The fascists sought to overthrow Giuseppe Saragat's center-left government, and they were supported by hundreds of National Vanguard militants, 187 members of the State Forestry Corps, and 1,000 Milan-based army dissidents. United States president Richard Nixon and his administration followed the coup preparations, but only a few marginalized sectors of the CIA supported the coup, and the fascists' plan to involve US and NATO warships in the Mediterranean in the coup would go awry due to a lack of supranational support.

The plan was for the Forestry Corps to seize the headquarters of the public television broadcaster RAI, while the National Vanguard would occupy the Interior Ministry and seize weapons, and the soldiers would occupy the Italian Communist Party stronghold of Sesto San Giovanni. The plan would culminate with the kidnapping of President Saragat and the murder of police chief Angelo Vicari, and the fascists would be able to seize power. A few militants even entered the Interior Ministry headquarters, but the coup was called off after Lt. Col. Amos Spiazzi - the head of the army dissidents - discovered that the Christian Democracy government had found out about the coup plans, and was ready to suppress the plotters and declare martial law.

On 18 March 1971, the leftist journal Paese Sera published an article revealing the plot, and the first arrests concerning the coup attempt were made that same day. After Giulio Andreotti became Defense Minister once again, Andreotti discovered the inner workings of the conspiracy, discovering that close confidants of the state security service had backed the coup. This led to the sacking of former intelligence head Vito Miceli, and to 45 others being charged with crimes related to the coup attempt.